


i feel lucky (with the worst luck)

by talriconosco



Series: essential, and destructive [2]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Angst, Duelling, Father Figures, Fighting, Gen, don't duel folks, references to corporal punishment, you've driven lafayette to drink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-02
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-06-05 20:16:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6721777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/talriconosco/pseuds/talriconosco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Alexander follows the General away, and John is left on the dueling field, standing alone in the ice and mud with a still-warm pistol in his hand.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Laurens, after the duel. Companion piece to <i>what air is to fire</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i feel lucky (with the worst luck)

**Author's Note:**

> title from the boxer rebellion, "big ideas." thanks to [ossapher](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ossapher/pseuds/ossapher) and [lavenderskates](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ossapher/pseuds/lavenderskates) for their interest in the idea!
> 
> come talk to me on [tumblr](http://talriconosco.tumblr.com/)!

“Meet me inside,” the General barks, and John freezes for a second because he's never seen him look so furious, like the rage is boiling up out of his body.

The General’s hands are clenched as he turns on his heel and stalks away. John almost follows, reflexively, until he remembers—it wasn’t Laurens that he called, it was Hamilton—and there’s Alexander, stiffly following at an exact and precise three feet behind.

_Christ Almighty_ , John panics, _this is a disaster, Alexander is going to quit, or the General will kill him, Alexander will never get a command now, this is all my fault, all my fault, why didn’t he call me, why Alexander, why—_

It is a long moment before John can truly think again, as the familiar rush of nerves from battle slowly relinquishes its grip on his chest.

John tries to breathe. He knows why, of course. You’d have to be an idiot to miss it; for months, Alexander has bristled at every word from the General, and the General’s responses have shifted from affection to irritation, from indulgent nods to clipped dismissals. You can’t walk into a room with the both of them and not feel the circling hurricane of tension, damp and hot.

So Alexander follows the General away, and John is left on the dueling field, standing alone in the ice and mud with a still-warm pistol in his hand.

 

\---

 

He makes it nearly back to camp before it hits him. He’d just shot Lee, at close range, and yes, he’s fought and killed in battle but those were redcoats, this is different; they’d both had pistols drawn—before he knows what is happening, John is on his knees, vomiting into the snow.

John does not fear death. He would welcome the glory of a noble sacrifice, and he’d die in a second to make his family and his nation proud. 

(That is what John tells himself, and what he will cling to in that singular and shattering moment, when it comes.)

But this? 

_Thi_ _s was a mistake,_ John realizes, and he retches as much from his actions as from the taste of his own bile.

 

\---

 

Headquarters, when John reaches it, is empty at first glance. The usual guards are nowhere to be seen, and in the late afternoon sun it is impossible to tell if candles are lit inside.

“Hello,” he calls softly upon entering the hall. There’s a cold sweat on his palms and he’s acutely aware of the pistol upon his belt, as though something terrible and fundamental about it has changed— _it’s just a gun, John, just a gun_ —

There’s no answer, not at first, and John only hears the loud and throbbing staccato of his own heartbeat.

“In here, Laurens.” Lafayette’s voice, from the kitchen. 

John swallows. They hadn’t told Lafayette about the duel, not knowing if he would approve or if he would tell the General, but in those four syllables John knows that Lafayette knows. More than that, Lafayette does not approve.

John forces himself to walk to the kitchen before his pace can falter. Lafayette is leaning against the table, a bottle of wine in his hand— _and Christ, he’s drinking straight from the bottle,_ John thinks, _we’ve driven him to drink—_

“You,” Lafayette narrows his eyes. “You have much to explain, starting with what creature took your mind today and—”

“Where is Alexander? Where is the General?” John interrupts, stomach roiling, because even though he deserves Lafayette’s scorn and more, he must first learn what has happened, if he is to have any hope of saving Alexander from himself.

“Can you not hear it?” Lafayette tilts his head upward with a half-laugh, setting down the bottle of wine after a long, slow swallow. “They are upstairs.”

Upstairs.

And in that instance the dissonance catches up to John; that his heart is beating slow and quiet, stunned, and that the regular, loud noise echoing through the empty house is not his lifeblood but the rhythmic sound of a calculated beating.

“No,” John gasps, and for a split second he is blinded with the crushing knowledge that this—their family, the nights around the fire, their trust—is utterly and irrevocably over. 

“He wouldn’t,” John chokes out, then, not sure of whom he speaks; for either situation is impossible. That an officer of honor would _beat_ his subordinate like a—like a child, or that Alexander would—Christ, that Alexander would allow it, would bend and prostrate himself for such humiliation, when it’s plain to see that Alexander’s feelings about the General are...complicated, at best. 

“The General? Non, he would not,” Lafayette shakes his head, drawing John’s attention even as darkness encroaches on his field of vision. “But Alexander made it a challenge. And they are both hardheaded and angry. Furieux.”

(If John could think, he would be able to picture it, all too easily: Alexander raising his chin and spitting fire, the General looming and refusing to back down, each word unintentionally but brutally lancing the deepest wounds that Alexander has long tried to hide.)

John’s world has narrowed to three sharpened points: the sounds from upstairs, strikes impacting again and again and again, the pistol on his hip—not to use it, no, not again, _never again—_ but the sick, guilty weight of it as it hangs, and the single realization that nothing will ever be the same.

“I did this,” he whispers, conscience screaming, and even as Lafayette is saying _Non, Laurens, non, you cannot_ he thinks _I have to stop it._

John lurches backward, reaching for the doorframe, and he’s turning to sprint down the hall and up the stairs—upstairs—but before he can take a step, there’s an unforgiving crush of Lafayette’s full body weight against him, thick arms circling his torso and trapping his own hands to his chest. 

And normally, that would be enough; John freely admits to himself that he is boisterous, but generally stops before engaging in true brawls, particularly with those he considers friends.

But this day is not a normal day, and what is happening upstairs is _all his fault_.

John fights it, kicking and biting, twisting in a panic to free his elbows, but though they are near the same height Lafayette is easily John’s superior in size. Drunk or not, in a matter of seconds Lafayette has him wrestled to his stomach the floor, face pressed sideways against the wood, hands pinned on his back, held down by Lafayette’s unforgiving knee.

“Not so fast, mon ami,” Lafayette snaps, then, an uncharacteristic note of anger in his voice. 

“Let _go,_ ” John hisses, twisting, but Lafayette on his back is implacable, pushing him into the floor with humiliating efficiency. “It’s my fault, let me go, you don’t understand!”

“I do not understand, Lieutenant Colonel?” Lafayette says then, slowly, and his voice is weighted with every ounce of his battlefield command, deeper and impossible to ignore. John flinches in a whole-body shudder, knowing his words were a mistake. “I do not understand why two men I called friends lied to me and to the General and nearly died? I do not understand why, despite direct orders to the contrary, you and Alexander deserted your posts and went to a dueling field this afternoon?”

Lafayette’s knee digs into his spine, harder, and John deflates.

As if on cue, the sounds from upstairs stop.

“I’m sorry,” John mumbles, the humiliation of his own reactions flushing hot in his face, half-pressed against dusty oak planks as it is. “Sir,” he appends, Lafayette’s _Lieutenant Colonel_ echoing in his mind. He’s suddenly and acutely aware that he’s now attacked two superior officers in the space of two hours, and forces himself to relax.

“Ah ah.” Lafayette doesn’t move. “If you wish to demonstrate your sincerity, you will have to do better than that. You did not see the General’s face when that poor Captain told him you and Alexander were engaging in a duel. Mon Dieu, he looked as though he would fall off his mount, as white as the snow.”

John wishes, fervently, to melt into the floor.

“I’m sorry,” he repeats.

“And?” Lafayette demands; he does lessen the pressure on John’s wrists, which had been verging on the edge of painful. John figures he will have bruises tomorrow; it’ll be his own fault, and hardly of note compared to the humiliations Alexander is going through.

“It was conduct unbecoming of my position,” John manages; Lafayette lifts his knee slightly in a tacit gesture to continue. “I…it was foolhardy, and I realize now that it was…immature to think that challenging Lee would…”

“It was not only childish. It was devoid of honor,” Lafayette corrects, voice cold.

Just then, the noises begin again upstairs; John flinches both from the sound and from Lafayette’s accusation, which is so far from what John knows—knew—to be true, and so far from what Lafayette himself has said on previous occasions that John, as much as he wants to, as much as he wants this entire ordeal to end and the matter to be entirely forgotten, cannot let it be in silence.

“But it was _about_ honor,” he protests. “It was precisely that which Lee violated in casting aspersions on His Excellency’s reputation, when it was Lee himself whose egregious lack of courage led to great losses for our cause!”

“Did His Excellency not directly order that the matter be ignored and let to rest?” Lafayette returns, none too gently. “Even if your intentions began in an honorable manner, in going against his wishes, you brought shame upon his camp and upon yourselves. Now it will be said that His Excellency cannot control his own aides, much less the Army.”

John’s mouth runs dry, at that. He’s no fool; he’d been acutely aware of the damage to the General’s reputation that Lee’s mudslinging could have caused. How had he been so blind as to ignore the effects of his own actions?

He tries to swallow, but cannot; he finds himself instead choked for breath, not at risk for tears but at the mercy of the nausea that is rising again in his gut. 

It’s silent in the house, he realizes dimly; he hears only his own ragged breathing and the calmer draws of Lafayette.

He hopes it is over, both for Alexander’s sake and—to his shame—for his own.

When the silence prevails, Lafayette loosens his hold.

“You will not disturb them,” Lafayette orders. John manages a nod and Lafayette stands in one smooth motion. John gasps in a deep breath and lifts himself to his knees, suddenly weary and aching. To John’s surprise, Lafayette reaches a hand down to help him up.

“I’m sorry,” he says again, accepting Lafayette’s hand and feeling for all the world like an untrained colt who’d been in need of breaking. “For…trying to fight with you. For everything.”

“You will apologize to the General, yes?” Lafayette asks pointedly, keeping a hold of John’s hand for longer than is strictly necessary.

“Yes, yes, of course,” John hastens. He will. It will be humiliating and he can only pray that the General will forgive him and allow him to retain his commission, but he will.

“Then I forgive you,” Lafayette says with a nod, his tone changing as he releases his hand. “If you can forgive me for the liberties taken with your person. It is only that Alexander, the fool, entreated me to ensure their privacy at all cost, even from you."

He shakes his head ruefully, stepping back to take another swig from the forgotten wine bottle.

John is stunned for a moment.

“He did?” 

“Oui,” Lafayette nods, drinking again. “He was most insistent that this was what he deserved, you see. He was prepared to resign entirely, had the General allowed it.”

“But it was my fault,” John says aloud, without thinking. 

Lafayette raises an eyebrow. “Oui,” he replies, slower. “You fired the gun. But you feel badly, non?”

“I feel sick,” John confirms, hollow.

“Our Alexander…he is not in a place where he allows himself to feel, not where His Excellency is concerned,” Lafayette continues, quieter. “I heard them, and went upstairs, but it was too late. You, mon cher John, you would have apologized and it would have been over. Nothing is so simple with Alexander. He asked for this,” Lafayette gestures broadly at the ceiling, bottle in hand.

“But you agreed? The General agreed?” John pushes, the slap of…whatever it had been…still reverberating unbidden in his skull. They’d deserved punishment, but _this_?

“Would you rather the General had discharged him entirely?” Lafayette returns, squarely. He lets it linger, staring at John, and John has no choice not to respond, numb.

“No, of course not.” 

“Then you see. Alexander is lucky, that the General humored him so,” Lafayette says, setting down the now-empty wine and straightening his coat. “Now, war waits for no man,” he continues. “I believe His Excellency requested that the results of your survey of the remaining cavalry officers be ready by tomorrow morning?”

“I—yes,” John says, automatically, and before he can fret further, Lafayette’s hand is on his shoulder, gentle now, guiding him down the hallway and back out into the frigid camp.

 


End file.
